Australia is a major agricultural producer and exporter. Agriculture and its closely related sectors earn $155 billion-a-year for a 12% share of GDP. Australian farmers and graziers own 135,996 farms, covering 61% of Australia’s landmass.

Across the country there is a mix of irrigation and dry-land farming. The CSIRO has forecast that climate change will cause decreased precipitation over much of Australia and that this will exacerbate existing challenges to water availability and quality for agriculture.

There are three main zones: the high rainfall zone of Tasmania and a narrow coastal zone; wheat, sheep zone, and the grazing of sheep (for wool, lamb and mutton) plus beef cattle) and the pastoral zone An indicator of viability of agriculture in the state of South Australia is whether land is within Goyder's Line.

Major agricultural products

Australia produces a large variety of primary products for both export and domestic consumption. The forecast top ten agricultural products by value are listed for year2017-2022, with production figures from previous years.^[6]

Commodity	2017-02	2018-03	2019-04	2020-05	2021-06	2022-07
Cattle and calves	6,617	5,849	6,345	7,331	7,082	6,517
Wheat	6,356	2,692	5,636	4,320	5,905	6,026
Milk	3,717	2,795	2,808	3,194	3,268	3,245
Fruit and nuts	2,333	2,408	2,350	2,640	2,795	2,915
Vegetables	2,269	2,126	2,356	2,490	2,601	2,715
Wool	2,713	3,318	2,397	2,196	2,187	2,138
Barley	1,725	984	1,750	1,240	1,744	1,624
Poultry	1,175	1,273	1,264	1,358	1,416	1,461
Lambs	1,181	1,161	1,318	1,327	1,425	1,348
Sugar cane	989	1,019	854	968	1,037	1,208

Cereals, oilseeds and grain legumes are produced on a large scale in Australia for human consumption and livestock feed. Wheat is the cereal with the greatest production in terms of area and value to the Australian economy. Sugarcane, grown in tropical Australia, is also an important crop; however, the unsubsidised industry (while lower-cost than heavily subsidised European and American sugar producers) is struggling to compete with the huge and much more efficient Brazilian sugarcane industry.^{[citation needed]} Listed below is crop production by kilotonnes (five year average) for the largest crops:

Crop (kilotonnes)	New South Wales	Victoria	Queensland	Western Australia	South Australia	Tasmania	Total
Wheat	6714	2173	1301	6959	3382	23	20552
Barley	1070	1173	202	1511	2000	25	5981
Sorghum	739	3	1140	3	0	0	1885
Cottonseed	663	0	1140	3	0	0	1806
Canola	637	312	1	530	225	1	1706
Oats	360	420	7	588	137	8	1520
Lupins	140	30	0	1050	103	0	1323
Field peas	20	166	0	47	190	1	424
Maize	190	8	171	6	0	0	375
Chickpeas	86	20	56	29	5	0	196
Lentils	2	68	0	2	56	0	128
Broad beans	42	68	1	0	14	0	125
Sunflower seed	46	0	65	0	0	1	112